In wanting my car repaired?

[mssalteena]

Last week my parked and unattended car was hit by a bus.

Clearly I am not in any way liable.

Bus driver provided all details when I returned to car. Wheel was damaged so I had to have car recovered (and wait 3 hours in the freezing cold for the truck to turn up).

I now have no car. My insurers have said they can't repair it until I pay my excess (which is £500 and I really can't afford just before Christmas), they also can't provide me with a courtesy car now or possibly even during repair. As matters stand I might not get my car back until the New Year.

According to insurers they 'can't contact' the bus company and it could take 3 months for a response.

Surely given my car was parked they can waive the bloody excess?

No witnesses but bus has CCTV, driver admitted liability at scene and police were also in attendance as after smacking into my car the bus was blocking the road (and had to be towed away). Not near a church - hope whoever's accident that was is having more luck than me!

On the question of a replacement car, you can hire one yourself. You need to what's called 'mitigate your losses' so hire something comparable to your own car, and for as short a time as possible while your car is being repaired, but your loss of use (i.e. of your own car) is a 'consequential loss' following on from the bus driver's negligence. It might be an idea to inform the bus co you are doing so. Downside is that you will have to pay for the hire car yourself and claim the hire charges back from the bus co, upside is liability shouldn't be an issue.

Get proper advice before you do this on the basis that you're holding up repairs by not paying your excess, so they may refuse to pay as you'll be hiring the car before your insurer starts the claim process.

the £500 excess cost is in essence already spent on other things, I'm sure most people don't have a spare £500 2 weeks before Christmas.

Plus it wasn't my fault! it's not like I pay £500 and get it back next week, sounds like I could have to wait months or more. And if this isn't resolved by the time my insurance is renewed my premiums will go up too.

My insurers have had a week and haven't done anything apart from dick about and keep contradicting themselves in what they tell me.

I’m with the posters saying this is nothing to do with your insurers.

This happened to me about 3 weeks ago (not a bus, but a similarly large vehicle, belonging to a private company and subcontracted by the council). They left a form on my (parked car) with their insurer’s details. This was on a Saturday. By Tuesday morning (as we were going away) we had a courtesy car delivered to our home, thanks in no small part to my DH chasing and chasing them. As it’s my car, I contacted our insurer and notified them of the incident - they said “thank you” and sent me a letter acknowledging that it had happened. They are not involved at all, because I’m not making a claim on that policy! You need to get onto the bus company’s insurer and push and push I’m afraid.

My insurers claim they can't contact the bus company, and insist on me paying the excess. Even then there are no timescales for repair and no guarantee I'll get a replacement car.

The bus company (or rather their insurers) say they've not been contacted but that they will take months to investigate so my insurers should be dealing.

The accident management co said that it takes too long to get the money back from bus cos, so they wouldn't help. They also thought my insurers should deal and waive my excess.

I didn't pay an excess charge when a Post Office van drove into me when I was parked. I got a cheque from the post office to cover the repairs once they had received an estimate. IIRC.

@mssalteena

No witnesses but bus has CCTV, driver admitted liability at scene and police were also in attendance as after smacking into my car the bus was blocking the road (and had to be towed away). Not near a church - hope whoever's accident that was is having more luck than me!

Ah - that would have been strange! We live just off a road where a bus will hit a car a few times a year

So matters have moved on a bit.

I've now spoken to insurers again and to (another) accident management co. Because the bus is not showing on the Motor Insurers Database, they are regarding it as uninsured. However my understanding is fleet vehicles like buses etc usually don't appear on MID anyway.

The bus insurers I contacted (well, handling agents actually) had no details of the claim. And no one can confirm who insures the bus! I called the garage and they gave me another number, which put me through to a different number, which then asked me to submit a claim form. I only want to know who the bloody insurers are! AFAIK it's a legal requirement to provide insurance details.

Claim handler here

Some very wrong advice on this thread

If the bus insurers are not showing on the Motor Insurer Database your insurer can't waive the excess as they need proof of valid insurance.

Lots of people saying you are not claiming from your own insurer but the bus companies. Not strictly true how insurance normally works is that you contact your own insurer who pays for everything and then claims the cost back from the at fault insurer.

The best thing to do in this situation is contact an accident management company but you would need to find out where your car is first and you may be liable for the cost of recovery and storage fees for the car if you cancel the claim with your own insurer. The accident management company may be able to get this cost back from the at fault insurer but I would make sure that is something they can do before agreeing to it.

Unfortunately it sounds like you are with not a very good insurance company

Surely they have public likability

It sounds absolutely dreadful, Could you not use twitter to press the bus company and insurer to pull their fingers out?

Just for future reference, Direct Line are brilliant as an insurance company.
I drove into a cherry picker at work and called them. I had a hire car by the end of the day, the bodywork place collected my car the next day and I only paid my excess when I eventually collected my car and dropped my hire car off the following day.

Sorry not read the full thread as I'm in a hurry, but when I got hit by a bus in my car, when I was a poor trainee, I rang the bus company and explained that if I had to pay my excess I wouldn't be eating for a month, but if they could admit liability formally to my insurers the insurance company could start repairs without taking the excess.

The bus company have passed me round the houses and basically can't or won't confirm insurance details.

My insurers and all accident management cos won't do anything without the insurer details.

Stalemate.

@mssalteena

The bus company have passed me round the houses and basically can't or won't confirm insurance details.

My insurers and all accident management cos won't do anything without the insurer details.

Stalemate.

All you have to give your insurer is a reg number and the rest is on them if you don't have more details than that.

The insurance co already have the reg no. But because they can't immediately confirm via MID that the bus is insured, they are insisting on me paying my Excess which I can't afford.

Accident management company will take it on at no charge to me but only if I can confirm the insurance details of the bus.

I can't get the details from the bus company.

I am so annoyed the bus company won't provide insurance details, as that is what is causing the problem.

It sounds like your insurance company is a bit rubbish but as others have said, the definition of an insurance policy excess is that it can't be waived.

£800 is a lot though, do you have a very expensive car or live in a high crime area or work as a paid assassin?

Newish car, I've been driving less than 5 years and I'm in London. This is the first year my premium has been below £1k.

My insurers could waive the excess given the circs, they've admitted that but it's the lack of insurers details for the bus that is causing all the problems and hold up.

Insurance worker here (although not a claim handler anymore).
I understand why you're frustrated OP but the basic issue is that when you took out your insurance, you agreed to pay the excess regardless of who is at fault if you claim.

Insurers will generally only waive it if they know exactly who will be reimbursing them their claim costs and they can't do that right now. As you're finding out, the bus company isn't very cooperative.
(Fwiw, with bus companies, usually the driver has to fill out a report and pass it to their boss who reviews it and passes it to someone in the office who then files it with head office and at some point the overall transport manager or someone will inform their insurer (unless they self insure). It can take weeks and weeks before someone puts that report alongside the letters from your insurance and provide a response.

You are going to struggle to find a claim management company to take you on (although I'm sure some will). But you'd be better trying to get your hands on your excess and kick your insurers arse to get the repairs underway.

Most EUI policies include a courtesy car as standard I think (I'm insured with them) but it's provided by their repairer so you won't have it until your repairs start. If at that point they don't provide one, they should hire one for you so they can fulfill your policy BUT replacement cars are in short supply right now so it may be a struggle for them to find you one.
If they can't give you one you're entitled to Loss of Use payments which were £20 per day when I did the job but this could be different now.

It seems unfair but it's how insurance works. The excess should be reimbursed to you but until the bus company play ball (and they can be a complete PITA) your insurer will be out of pocket which is why you have to pay your excess.

It is unfair. Especially because it's only the lack of insurance details which is causing all this hassle.

My partner had an accident where a lady pulled out from a side road and hit his car. She admitted liability immediately and her insurers were on the phone to him within the hour to sort out repairs and ask about injuries.

Yet I can't even get these idiots at the bus co to confirm who their insurers are which is a legal requirement. Any other individual or company confirms their details what makes them so special?

With companies like this it's usually either because the driver and some office staff don't actually know who the insurer is or they self insure. It's a crap system but that's why you are able to alter the amount of excess on your policy when you set it up - so you can process a claim in the event of something like this (or if someone hit your car and didn't leave details).

Unfortunately it's often the same if you're hit by a council vehicle, emergency vehicle, diplomatic vehicle, hire vehicle etc.

Once you make a claim, your insurer will be out of pocket and have losses to chase which gives them the push to fight in your behalf but also the right to take legal action if needed (which they can't do without losses to chase).

I've now emailed the bus company as well as calling but I'm still no further forward.

Given that exchanging insurance details is a legal requirement it's really poor that the bus company can't provide this information. So I either have to claim on my insurance which I shouldn't have to do, paying an excess I can't afford to fork out for right this minute because I don't get paid until after Xmas, or wait for weeks/ months until the bus company finally respond.

I wish we were like other European countries who have to display proof of insurance on their vehicles. Would save all this stress.